Adblockers

[CriticalRabbit 6]

 

Hi,

 

How much do you trust ublock in FireFox? I'm very careful with the types of add-ons that I use. I'm currently using HTTPS everywhere, Privacy badger (I have a lot of respect for the EFF) and noscript. However, I feel somewhat naked without a good adblock add-on. With that being said, though, I have noscript set so that it blocks scripts globally and I only manually enable scripts for a very select few websites, AirVpn included.

 

So, do you use and trust ublock and if so, why? I appreciate that Mozilla has partially reviewed the code for ublock for FireFox but I've read some worrying things about ublock over the past few weeks.

 

Best,

Rabbit

[rainmakerraw 94]

What kind of worrying things have you read? Genuine question, as I've not seen anything. I can only add that uBlock is open source and freely available on github so at least it's transparent and auditable. What's supposed to be 'wrong' with it?

[OpenSourcerer 1442]

noscript

 

Used in the right way, this is the best adblock addon you will find.

 

Anyway, in my topic About funding browser extensions people listed many more addons for Firefox-based browsers directly enhancing privacy.

[CriticalRabbit 6]

 

I'll try and find a source. It was to do with the development of the add-on, apparently there are two different developers (one for Chrome one for FireFox?) that are in some sort of disagreement. Someone else might be able to clarify this.

 

I appreciate that it's open source but I won't be compiling it myself so I therefore have to have a degree of trust in the developers. Being open source is always a good start however.

[CriticalRabbit 6]

 

noscript

 

Used in the right way, this is the best adblock addon you will find.

 

Anyway, in my topic About funding browser extensions people listed many more addons for Firefox-based browsers directly enhancing privacy.

 

 

I might just stick with noscript then, given that it works well for blocking annoying adverts. I don't mind non-intrusive adverts anyway and rarely notice them with noscript enabled.

[rickjames 106]

 

 

noscript

 

Used in the right way, this is the best adblock addon you will find.

 

Anyway, in my topic About funding browser extensions people listed many more addons for Firefox-based browsers directly enhancing privacy.

 

 

I might just stick with noscript then, given that it works well for blocking annoying adverts. I don't mind non-intrusive adverts anyway and rarely notice them with noscript enabled.

 

giganerd's on point, noScript is probably the best bet.

 

Something to keep in mind is many ad blockers don't actually block the ad's they only hide them with css or div removals. So often the content is still loaded "just hidden". The ad server is often still contacted by your browser but the ad's are just afk.

 

The only other option I can think of would be running a massive block list via the host file or using something similar to PeerGuardian.

 

-GL

[OpenSourcerer 1442]

By the way, I use Disconnect along with it. It seems to still block connections to services NoScript should have blocked..

 

(Sent via Tapatalk 4)

[CriticalRabbit 6]

 

 

 

 

 

 

noscript

Used in the right way, this is the best adblock addon you will find.

 

Anyway, in my topic About funding browser extensions people listed many more addons for Firefox-based browsers directly enhancing privacy.

 

I might just stick with noscript then, given that it works well for blocking annoying adverts. I don't mind non-intrusive adverts anyway and rarely notice them with noscript enabled.

giganerd's on point, noScript is probably the best bet.

 

Something to keep in mind is many ad blockers don't actually block the ad's they only hide them with css or div removals. So often the content is still loaded "just hidden". The ad server is often still contacted by your browser but the ad's are just afk.

 

The only other option I can think of would be running a massive block list via the host file or using something similar to PeerGuardian.

 

-GL

 

This was an additional concern of mine; I've read conflicting things about ublock in terms of how it deals with ads, e.g. does it block entirely or just hide them. I'll just stick with noscript. Cheers

[rainmakerraw 94]

 

 

 

 

 

 

noscript

Used in the right way, this is the best adblock addon you will find.

 

Anyway, in my topic About funding browser extensions people listed many more addons for Firefox-based browsers directly enhancing privacy.

 

I might just stick with noscript then, given that it works well for blocking annoying adverts. I don't mind non-intrusive adverts anyway and rarely notice them with noscript enabled.

giganerd's on point, noScript is probably the best bet.

 

Something to keep in mind is many ad blockers don't actually block the ad's they only hide them with css or div removals. So often the content is still loaded "just hidden". The ad server is often still contacted by your browser but the ad's are just afk.

 

The only other option I can think of would be running a massive block list via the host file or using something similar to PeerGuardian.

 

-GL

This was an additional concern of mine; I've read conflicting things about ublock in terms of how it deals with ads, e.g. does it block entirely or just hide them. I'll just stick with noscript. Cheers

 

uBlock uses the same lists as AdBlock Plus and the others, so you decide. You can subscribe to easyprivacy, Fanboy's tracking and enhanced privacy lists etc or just stick with the defaults. If I connect to a particular site, uBlock reports - for example - connected to 1 out of 6 domains. This signifies I have connected to the site I wanted to visit, but connections to third party domains (trackers etc) are blocked. Hope this helps.

[rickjames 106]

If I connect to a particular site, uBlock reports - for example - connected to 1 out of 6 domains. This signifies I have connected to the site I wanted to visit, but connections to third party domains (trackers etc) are blocked. Hope this helps.

 

 

The million dollar question is was it actually blocked.

Using something like Wireshark or jnettop would be the only way to truly know. I don't know enough about the code it uses to say either way but it would be interesting to test it.

[encrypted 13]

I wish either branch of ublock was available on F-Droid.

[zhang888 1066]

I wish either branch of ublock was available on F-Droid.

 

uBlock is a browser addon and not a standalone package, so it cannot be distributed in F-Droid as an .apk for that reason.

However, if you use Fennec (or maybe even stock Firefox) on Android, uBlock works on it pretty well.

[victorab 12]

Hi,

you can audit/decompile any chrome or firefox extension very easily and see how it works. Most of the time, it's only few js.

 

For Firefox:

Go on the extension download page but don't click on Add to Firefox. Instead, make a right click on it and "save as".

You will have a .xpi extension file. Change the extension to .zip and open it. Enjoy.

 

For chrome

Copy the Chrome market URL of the extension on past it on http://crx.zhuzhu.org/ (or a similar website).

You will  have a .crx extension file. Change the extension to .zip and open it. Enjoy